Many people carry irrational fears which keep them from achieving goals, functioning normally, or enjoying daily life as usual. Some people are just afraid of insects, which is pretty insignificant in the grand scheme of things, but my irrational fear is that I will never see the strong and fit woman I feel on the inside actually become a reality on the outside.

Throughout my weight loss journey, I’ve tried various methods of weight loss and fat loss. I consider them two different things because when people want to lose weight they eat less and exercise more. When people want to lose fat, they typically eat more and exercise more to increase muscle mass. Well, for a majority of my weight loss journey, I was a cardio junkie who barely ate over 1200 calories a day and ate a 40 calorie fudge pop for a treat when I’d done well. While this method was effective for my goal to lose weight, it also obliterated my muscle mass and left me with a lot of extra skin. My arms hang down, and I’m insecure about it, so I wear long t-shirts and three-quarter sleeves. My stomach droops, so I wear tummy controlling compression pants when I work out. I am constantly adjusting and readjusting my body to conceal the extra skin I carry as a reminder that I was once fat, lazy, and depressed. I don’t mean to be graphic, but it’s the truth.

When I am on a roll and I’ve been doing well with eating right, exercising effectively, and keeping a positive attitude, I will often sabotage myself because I carry irrational fears that I will never see in the mirror how I feel when I run or lift or stretch. I am afraid that I will meet my body fat goal and my weight goal but still carry all the evidence of who I used to be. I’m afraid that after all the time and money I’ve put into improving my body on the inside and the outside will be futile because after all of that hard work and dedication I may have to save up thousands of dollars to remove the extra skin my body had to grow to compensate for my over-consumption.

What if I never get to see my body as the incredible machine it is? What if I put in all this work only to have to invest more time, money, and recovery into reshaping my body surgically? What if I can’t afford that surgery? How will I learn to be okay with my body? How will I feel to be in a bathing suit, much less naked? If that’s what I have to look forward to, why do I continue?

I keep chugging along, hoping that this work will be worth it in the end. I keep hoping that with enough fat loss and muscle gain, I will see a strong and fit woman in my mirror. Some days, it’s hard not to binge and think that I’d be happier if I didn’t give food or my body fat content so much power in my mind. But I keep going. I keep changing it up. I keep trying new things to get results.

Sometimes this weight loss junk requires a lot of blind faith. I just hope I put my faith in the right place.